Writings, observations and ideas either caused by or meant to induce a minor disruption.

Sunday, April 14, 2013

Cement Barge

Between Exchange Place and Lower Manhattan floats Cement Barge. Pushed by a tugboat where the entire crew smells like Old Spice, the barge just floated there, ready to provide construction materials for shoreline projects. Work and life and interconnectivity all made possible by rivers and the cities that grow alongside them.

Lehigh Cement. Did the barge sail up somehow through the Erie Canal down to the Hudson. Did the crew sing Erie Canal as well as other river shanties (Shenandoah) as they hauled along the bowline? I love the idea of this barge never going into the ocean to bring that glue of civilization –concrete – to the watery threshold of our urban life. How does one get one from Lehigh to the submerged border between NY/NJ.

You see a lot of stuff with only implied explanation on our river, where unseen conjoins with other rivers and also unseen flows to the sea. All we know is that the river always flows and the sea is never filled.